Mythili G. Rao writes about “The Red Years,” a collection of poems attributed to a North Korean dissident writing under the pen name Bandi.
Pyeongchang, South Korea, where the Winter Olympics are currently under
way, is extremely cold. Subzero temperatures inspired organizers to plan
a relatively swift opening ceremony,
forced biathletes to reconsider their choice of gloves,
and sent television commentators in frantic search of cosmetics that
wouldn’t freeze their faces off.
Watching the Games, I have been thinking about the temperature fifty
miles north, on the other side of the D. M. Z., where basic
amenities—never mind battery-powered jackets,
space heaters, free coffee, and weatherproof foundation—are harder to
come by. Power outages are common in North Korea: in recent years,
according to some reports, the country’s net electricity usage fell to
nineteen-seventies levels, even as its population grew by nearly ten
million. Then there is the untold number of prisoners in labor camps;
presumably, their defenses against the weather are grossly limited.
The impassivity of the natural world—and the ruthlessness of winter, in
particular—is a recurring theme in “The Red Years,” a new collection of
political poems attributed to a North Korean dissident writing under the
pen name Bandi. “The Red Years” was published in South Korea in January;
it does not yet have a publisher in the United States. The book is a
kind of companion to “ The Accusation,”
the collection of Bandi’s short stories published in the U. S. by Grove
Atlantic, last March—these poems are said to have been part of the
original, crumbling manuscript, which was smuggled across the border, enclosed in a copy of “The Selected Works of Kim Il Sung” at the urging
of one of Bandi’s defector relatives.
“The Accusation” was translated into English by Deborah Smith, who is
best known for her work with Han Kang,
the author of “ The Vegetarian .”
In Smith’s hands, the stories of “The Accusation” conveyed something
powerful and subtle about life under totalitarianism.
